Queen Elizabeth may be buying Prince Andrew’s claims that he didn’t become intimate with a 17-year-old “sex slave” of longtime friend Jeffrey Epstein, and she may be happy to smile for the cameras while accompanying her embattled 59-year-old son to Sunday church services.

But Prince Charles, her oldest son and her heir to the throne, is angry that younger brother has dragged the royal family into all of Epstein’s tawdriness, Vanity Fair is reporting. The focus on Andrew’s decades-long friendship with Epstein intensified over the weekend when the enigmatic multimillionaire financier and accused sex trafficker was found dead of an apparent suicide in his Manhattan jail cell.

Prince Andrew, left, and the now-deceased Jeffrey Epstein were friends for years. (Getty Images and the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office)

“Andrew welcomed Epstein at Windsor Castle, Sandringham, and Balmoral at different points during their friendship, which led to tensions between him and Charles,” a royal source told Vanity Fair’s royal reporter Katie Nicholl.

“Charles has disapproved of quite a lot of Andrew’s friends and acquaintances over the years, and Epstein is no exception,” the source added. “I was told he was very concerned about the friendship for a long time and saw it as a disaster waiting to happen.”

So, forget Meghan Markle guest-editing the British version of Vogue or other tabloid reports about her, Prince Harry, Prince William and Kate Middleton upsetting convention, not getting along or jockeying for power and public adoration.

The real royal scandal — the really serious royal scandal — involves the Duke of York, who long ago was nicknamed “Randy Andy” by the British press and who is said to be the queen’s favorite son.

Since 2011, Andrew has been accused in lawsuits and interviews of having sex with Epstein’s alleged “sex slave” Virginia Roberts Giuffre in the early 2000s. Giuffre has claimed that, as a teenage girl, she was recruited by Epstein’s socialite friend Ghislaine Maxwell at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, then groomed by Maxwell and Epstein to be an underage prostitute and to have sex with Epstein and his powerful friends. Giuffre alleged that Andrew was one of the beneficiaries of these services during three encounters in New York, London and on the financier’s private estate in the Virgin Islands.

Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Andrew ride in a car following a church service Aug. 11 near Balmoral Castle in Scotland. (Duncan McGlynn/Getty Images)

The allegations against Andrew reached new levels of urgency over the past month, after Epstein arrested July 7 on new sex trafficking allegations.

Then came last week’s release of 2,000 pages of previously sealed court documents. The documents revealed more details about Andrew’s travels with Epstein, shared a photo of Andrew with his arm around Giuffre when she was 17, and offered the testimony of a second accuser. Johanna Sjoberg testified in a deposition that Andrew fondled her breast and made sexual advances on her and Giuffre with a puppet that looked like him while they were at Epstein’s Manhattan mansion in 2001.

Epstein’s death Saturday rocked the halls of power on both sides of the Atlantic. The FBI is investigating how America’s most high-profile prisoner wasn’t guarded more closely, while federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York have pledged to continue their investigation of his alleged sex trafficking operation by focusing on his alleged co-conspirators.

That includes Maxwell, who the Daily Beast reported was good friends with Andrew and a frequent guest at his apartment in Buckingham Palace. The Daily Beast also cited sources who said that Maxwell found women in London for Andrew to have sex with.

Prince William, from left, Prince Andrew and Prince Charles arrive at Westminster Abbey in London for the funeral service for the Queen Mother in 2002. (Michael Crabtree/Getty Images Archives)

Several lawmakers in the British Parliament have called for an investigation into the duke’s friendship with Epstein. Vanity Fair said this is one indicator of how the allegations against Andrew “cannot be erased” — much as the queen and other royal family members may wish — and have “ruffled feathers” at the highest levels of the U.K. government.

Until Monday, Andrew was vacationing with his mother, father Prince Philip, ex-wife Sarah Ferguson and other family members at Balmoral, the queen’s estate in the Scottish Highlands, according to The Daily Mail. He flew into Aberdeen airport last week on a private plane and was expected to spend the entire week at Balmoral; he flew out Monday.

As news of Epstein’s death has dominated the headlines, the duke has not had “easy conversations with both his mother and father,” a source told Vanity Fair. “But he has always insisted he has done nothing wrong and that the charges are fallacious. His parents believe him.”

It is perhaps for that reason that Queen Elizabeth was willing to ride with him to church Sunday morning — and to wear a big grin while sitting with him in the backseat of a car.

“It was interpreted by some as an act of defiance, which upset some royalists who felt it was poor (judgment) on the queen’s part,” Vanity Fair reported.

President Donald Trump, from left, Prince and Dean of Westminster John Hall chat at Westminster Abbey in London on June 3. (Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Charles was at Balmoral with his wife, Camilla, the Daily Mail reported. They also went to church Sunday, but they drove separately.

Vanity Fair and other outlets have reported that Charles has long grown weary of his brother’s indiscretions. Over the years, Andrew has developed a reputation for pomposity and self-importance, which has made him a frequent object of derision in British society, the Daily Beast reported in 2018. He also had fallen into what Vanity Fair in 2011 called a dissolute lifestyle and a habit of currying friendships and financial favors from unsavory international figures such as Epstein.

The Giuffre allegations came to light with her interview with the Daily Mail in early 2011. About the same time, photographs surfaced of Andrew casually strolling with Epstein in New York’s Central Park.

Meanwhile, Ferguson was caught on tape demanding $821,000 from an undercover reporter disguised as a businessman in return for access to Andrew, Vanity Fair reported. She also was forced to publicly apologize for allowing Andrew to get more than $18,000 from Epstein to help her settle a debt to her former assistant.

These scandals raised a furor in the British press and House of Commons in 2011 and prompted a sit-down with the queen, Vanity Fair and other outlets reported. The furor prompted Andrew to agree to step down from his beloved and prominent job as U.K.’s special representative for international trade and investment.

Since then, there had been efforts by Andrew and by some in the royal family to rehabilitate his image and bring him back into the inner circle of “Team Windsor,” the Daily Mail reported in 2017. Through friends, Andrew acknowledged he was “a fool” over his friendship with Esptein and accepted that the allegations have been “deeply uncomfortable” for the royal family, the Telegraph reported.

At the same time, Charles and Andrew reportedly have been at odds over the future king’s vision of a streamlined royal family for the 21st century, the Daily Beast reported in 2017. This vision means putting William, Kate, Harry and Meghan at center stage during major royal events — not Andrew or his daughters, Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie.

Over the weekend, Buckingham Palace repeated its denials, acknowledging that Andrew once was friends with Epstein but denying he did anything illegal.

“It is emphatically denied that the Duke of York had any form of sexual contact or relationship with Virginia Roberts,” the palace said in a statement. “Any claim to the contrary is false and without foundation.”

But such denials so far have not served to distance Andrew from reports about Epstein’s alleged crimes.

Given Andrew’s senior position in the royal family, “some feel that the duke must explain his friendship with the late sex offender,” Vanity Fair reported.

Added the royal source: “This story isn’t going away, and no one knows what will come out next.”

Martha Ross is a features writer who covers everything and anything related to popular culture, society, health, women’s issues and families. A native of the East Bay and a graduate of Northwestern University and Mills College, she’s also a former hard-news and investigative reporter, covering crime and local politics.